Must-Watch DJ Movies You Haven’t Seen

If you haven’t seen Scratch, Maestro, and It’s All Gone Pete Tong, you’re missing out. But most of us have seen these DJ classics – so we decided to investigate the lesser-known gems that really get to the heart of DJ culture and that you can watch right now! Put the popcorn in the microwave and read on to start your weekend off by watching some great productions!

Congratulations, you made it to Friday. Most of the TechTools team is deep in preparations for what’s shaping up to be an incredible April, but in the spirit of the eminent weekend we took some time to snoop around the web for the awesome finds below!

Individual Artists

Slices: Pioneers of Electronic Music Vol. 1 – Richie Hawtin

Arguably one of the biggest and most consistant contributors to electronic music and minimal techno over the last 20 years, Richie Hawtin is a legend who deserves some time on the silver screen.

Inside Ibiza with Roger Sanchez

Renowned music journalist Terry Church is the writer and director behind this web series that focuses around DJ culture on the infamous island of Ibiza. It follows Roger Sanchez on his residency and beyond, and is a fascinating look at life on the White Isle.

Documentary on Diplo

Love him or hate him, Diplo is one of the most important DJs of the last decade. This short documentary is a rare introspective glance at Diplo and his thoughts about himself and the world around him.

Genre Retrospectives

From Jack to Juke: 25 Years of Ghetto House

We think the description on this film explains it best:

Currently all the rage with hipsters worldwide, Chicago Juke music has roots that run deep. The film chronicles the birth and evolution of a genre over 25 years.

Pump Up The Volume: The History of House Music

This 2001 documentary follows the entire path of house music, from underground clubs in Chicago to the middle of the current incredible peak that house has hit over the last 20 years. “This is the story of the people who made House” quips the narration early in the film – and it’s indeed studded with classic house stars. This documentary isn’t available for purchase, but someone’s uploaded the entire thing (albiet in low quality) to YouTube!

Sampling, Copyrights, and DJ Law

Copyright Criminals

“There’s a copyright lawyer, and there’s all the hip-hop guys, and they’re all saying why sampling/using someone else’s music in your own is okay or not okay,” says Mitch Manchild, DJ TechTools’ production guru and the man who solders all of our Midi Fighters. “George Clinton is in this one as well – and reveals that he doesn’t like hip hop!”

If you can’t watch it on Hulu in your country, it’s also available for streaming on Netflix Instant!

Rip! A Remix Manifesto

This 2009 documentary focuses around how remix and mashup culture is challenging copyright all over again- just as the stars of Copyright Criminal did nearly a decade earlier. Greg Gillis, more commonly known as Girl Talk, is the main star of this film. Can’t watch on Hulu in your country or just want to own the documentary for yourself? Pay what you want to download it over at the official site: http://ripremix.com

Really great to see BBC documentary: “Krautrock: The Rebirth of Germany”
Documentary which looks at how a radical generation of musicians created a new German musical identity out of the cultural ruins of war.http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00nf10k

Morganwilliamsdj

Put The Needle on the Record was a really good doc too.

Anonymous

has anyone here mentioned ‘Hey DJ!’? The movie’s ‘gimmick’, so to say, was that the entire movie was set to a 90 minute DJ mix. the scenes transitioned with the music, sometimes not to full effect, but it was awesome. it was similar in tone with ‘It’s All Gone Pete Tong’ but this was about a DJ trying to make it in Miami, starting from nothing. It was pretty interesting, and the movie started off with ‘Scissor Sisters – Filthy / Gorgeous (Paper Faces Remix)’.

Darryn Summers

Modulations???? How old are you people????? Seriously…..

Darryn Summers

Modulations – best electronic music documentary ever!!!! Look it up people!!!!

swagmeister

Interesting Post, but you forgot Swedish House Mafias own movie. It’s not a documentary, in the movie you follow the guys between between 2007 and 2009.

thank you djtt for the the revitalization of my love of electronic music, recently though it was getting all to generic thanks to likes of David Guetta, but with the original 80’s stylings of Jamie Jones my love is back…

Ugueto96

I don’t know if this should be call a DJ movie but well I’d love to see it. The new ultra movie. Can U Feel It. seems really cool.

Ugueto96

I loved those movies, especially the documentary on Diplo, his story is fascinating. I myself instead of watching documentaries love to watch DJs in action so here are a few you could see:
Inside Ibiza with Roger Sanchez series
In the Booth with Tiesto series
Check the pioneerdjsounds on youtube. Their videos are GREAT.
Especially their pioneer dj shows, great videos, and you get to see the full thing.

“one more time” is a great A+++++ documentary about the rise of/history of the UK clubbing scene. since around 88 till now. I also liked “weekender” which was a film about the acid house scene in manchester in the 90’s

Great little list though and thanks for the links.

To be honest it’d make a great section for the site if we could have an archive (even if just links) to DJ/music scene materials like film’s, music, Funnies, iconic photo’s, iconic advertisement material etc. just have a separate area for user uploads so to keep the archive fresh but integral. OM2C mind

hiscores

Wild Style … a MUST!
It’s Hip-hop, but what an amazing record of a very influential time.

This unrelated to the article but important for the site. I am sick of that little pop up stopping my flow of reading with a buggy pop-up, dimmed screen and semi-hard to locate close tab. I’ve already signed up, quit hassling me. Its annoying

Spacecamp

Thanks for the feedback – we’ll make it less annoying soon! Especially if you’ve already signed up, it shouldn’t keep pestering you. Rude!

oh yea and dont forget about “Party Monster” more of a movie, but portrays the NY life started by the “clubkids”

riggs

“secondhand sureshots” is a cool short film that takes 4 socal beatmakers(j rocc included), has them pluck 3 or 4 records from a thrift store and make beats with only those records. it chronicles the entire process from digging to sampling to sequencing. can’t remember where i got it, it’s online somewhere though.

josh@firestorm

its on vimeo i think

Maxime Robin

it was part of a special deluxe boxset including vinyls with the beats. It was for the 10 year anniversary of Dublab but it’s distributed by Stones Throw. But yeah the main part of the DVD is on Vimeo.

It’s cliched because it nails all the strerotypes of that scene so well. The creators said they wanted to create a document of the house music scene at that time – they succeeded – a classic!
When is “An Untitled Documentary About House Music” coming out?http://untitledhousemusicdocumentary.com/

banditmeerkat

@ lupzdut – It’s cliched because it nails all the strerotypes of that scene so well. The creators said they wanted to create a document of the house music scene at that time – they succeeded – a classic!
Don’t forget the grandaddy of all party movies – Saturday Night Fever

DJTT thanks for adding these links…. Just the fact I got to watch Slices has blown my mind. Ritchie was born a few years before me but our background is similar. Influenced by our fathers who loved electronic music for Hawtin it was hearing Kraftwerk for me it was hearing Tomita. We both left our home country at an early age, he was 9 and I was 7 which could well have ended up being the same year. My heart jumped as I saw a picture of a young Hawtin sat there with a Korg on his lap. I still have my POLY800. Sadly though over the years I wandered and got lost. Watching this film brought all this to the surface. I feel like 20years has passed that I’ll never get back. What I’m doing today is wonderful I feel like I’m actually doing what I should have done back in the late ’80s early ’90s. I feel sad but I’d rather see the film as a wake-up call. No I’m not 20 anymore but the passion, the energy is more alive now then it has been in the last 10 years. I know the truth is, I just didn’t have the confidence and the people around back then let me wander around aimlessly without helping me focus.

If you’re young and feel that creating music is what you want to do in life, then start doing it now and stay on track. Yeah playing the Xbox is fun or going out with friends is important but if you replace your ambitions and goals with these on a regular basis, then you may well wake up years later thinking, Where the hell am I? What happened? Why am I in a job I hate with a mortgage round my neck surrounded by people I actually have nothing in common with?

chad

honestly this could be some of the most inspiring word’s i have herd in awhile. All i can say is Thank You!

Anonymous

I highly recommend the movie ‘Groove’ it’s from 2000. It’s a little cliche at times but it gives you that feeling of longing for the good old days of fun parties and an awesome musical experience.

DJ z0d

Kinda cheesy, but I also admit to liking this one. :-) Brings back warm fuzzies…